ARTIST: Joseph Billanti (New York, Florida, 1925 - 2010)
NAME: Portrait of Girl with Cat
MEDIUM: watercolor on board
CONDITION: Very good.
SIGHT SIZE: 17 x 13 inches / 43 x 33 cm
BOARD SIZE: 20 x 15 inches / 50 x 38 cm
SIGNATURE: lower left
CATEGORY: antique vintage painting
SKU#: 116850
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BIOGRAPHY:
Joseph Billanti was a former South Beach of Staten Island, N. Y. resident and retired commercial artist who later in life painted the portraits of victims of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
Born in Manhattan, Mr. Billanti was brought to South Beach as an infant. He moved to Florida in the 1960s but periodically returned to South Beach and worked in his studio there.
His artwork appeared in product advertisements in Look and Life magazines, and he also worked on movie posters and advertisements. He later turned a long successful career as a commercial artist into a second one as a portrait painter.
Over the years, he was commissioned to paint the portraits of family, friends, neighbors and even victims of the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. At 80, he was taking photos of friends and family members and transforming them into lifelike portrait keepsakes.
"I use a jeweler's glass to study the face and features from the photograph that I'm going to work from," he told the Advance during a 2004 interview. "Then, after I get the features and face down in my head, I make a black-and-white sketch of the person. If I have to change something, I can make
another sketch before I start painting."
He began doodling on notebooks as a student at PS 46 in South Beach. A teacher was so impressed with a portrait he did of George Washington that the painting was framed and hung in the entrance hall of the school.
A childhood bout with polio kept him from being drafted during World War II, but the war effort also worked to his advantage when he was starting out in the art world. With most experienced workers in the commercial art industry drafted or enlisted, Billanti found advertising agencies willing to hire a young
startup with little formal training.
"It was an exciting time. There were so many newspapers and magazines in New York City. The agencies all had a dozen or more artists working on different accounts," he told the Advance. "I think that he was a very talented person who enjoyed his family and being with his nieces and nephews. He also
enjoyed a good political debate and poker," recalled his niece, Veronica D'Esposito.
Joseph Billanti died January 11, 2010 in the Carmel Richmond Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center, Dongan Hills, Staten Island, N. Y. where he had been a patient for the last month.